Discover your city. Record your experiences. STAMP is a new mobile platform that helps you find the best places in your town or city. STAMPs are short geo-tagged video reviews, created by our users, for our users. Join our closed alphaand start creating great content at your favourite locations now.

Welcome back friend. What a week it's been. We've gone from the uncertainty of not knowing whether our app could function well enough for an Alpha test, to seeing testers submit new locations and create great content through our platform!

Sure, things are still moving slowly, but as I checked out our Content Management System before switching off last night, I could see a whole bunch of new video reviews and a nice number of new locations ready to be approved for the platform. Hopefully we can maintain the momentum over the next week and in the run up to Christmas.

So big shout out to our alpha testers - you da real MVP.

Seriously though, alpha testers are kind of like that cool person at school you always wanted to impress. You want to be their friend, but not come across too pushy or excitable. That's tricky though when you need them to open emails and follow links to get access to your app.

Because you can't just download an alpha product from the app stores, you need to guide your testers through a sign up process, maybe get hold of their phone's UDID numbers, set them up with a profile on the distribution platform - all without losing them along the way.

So whilst you're trying to be chill and casual about getting them involved in the alpha, you're really just resisting the urge to send reminder emails, personal Facebook messages, maybe even a written letter in the post - all in the hope that they'll just cooperate with the process!

So on-boarding can be tricky I guess. That's why i'm trying a few things to establish a sense of community amongst our alpha testers. And nothing says community like another closed Facebook group for people to join. We've got one for the STAMP alpha team and its a hive of activity...my activity. I've resorted to asking testers who've emailed me personally to give feedback if they wouldn't mind posting it in the group so we can start generating a bit of conversation and debate amongst the testers.

It's early days, but as people grow frustrated with our UI/UX problems and occasional random crashes, i'm sure they'll know where they can best vent their anger.

Once I know our alpha testers have downloaded STAMP - they get automatically added to my daily, personalised email automation. Its called STAMP Essentials and it comprises of 6 days of high quality email content. Its kind of like these Journal entries, just in email form. (Little more focussed, little less rambly). Its basically designed to deliver the key concepts that underpin STAMP in daily manageable chunks.

After that - i'm all out of ideas. Im relying on their good will and passion for new tech. Financial incentives are an option I guess, but I suppose i'm just trying to see if I can grow and maintain organic participation. You know - save the monies for when we embark on real user acquisition.

You're probably thinking that this all sounds super interesting. Well its not too late to get involved. Our alpha is still welcoming new additions and we'd love for you to be involved. All you have to do is sign up on our website, check your spam for our emails (thanks Mailchimp) and we'll guide you through the process of getting set up on the platform. Its super simple. promise.

Hopefully this time next week, I'll be raving about content that you (yes you!) have created...